I had the opportunity to represent Sahana and Sri Lanka at III International Congress event in Gijon, Spain. The event was about building better corporation between “north” and “south” countries and for learning about the innovation in ICT that was coming up from the south. The audience was represented by policy makers in Europe and the UN and innovators from Africa and Asia. I was invited to speak as well as be a round table participant and I took that opportunity to talk about Sahana, H-FOSS and also brought some awareness to the ICT industry in South Asia. In the Round Table discussions keep points I mentioned was that innovation from the south too often get’s tagged with an ICT4D banner for novelty and this hides it’s true potential to be applicable as an globally applicable innovation in its own right. I also am not a fan of the "North/South" term and any demarcation that creates artificial barriers for collaboration. In cyberspace at least we are all equal and social networking is working to eliminate such divides as it no longer matter where you live. Overall I met some great people and made good friends amongst the participants and speakers and look forward to further collaboration with them. Notable for Sahana we made some good links to collaborate with Ushahadi, TachicalTech and UNDP.
References:
- III Congress Coop 2.0 Event: http://encuentro2010.fundacionctic.org/en/ponentes/
- Presentation: http://www.slideshare.net/cooperacionarroba/evolution-of-the-sahana-open-source-project
- Newspaper article: http://www.lne.es/gijon/2010/03/02/creamos-software-libre-sri-lanka-gestion-desastres-tsunami/880526.html
- Newspaper article 2: http://www.europapress.es/asturias/innova-00297/noticia-innova-fundacion-sahana-presentara-cooperacion-20-herramienta-gestion-ayuda-desastres-20100123120539.html
- Newspaper article 3: http://mas.lne.es/siasturias/etiquetas/iii-congreso-internacional-de-tic-en-cooperacion-al-desarrollo/
